Saturday, November 12, 2016

When I was going through the surrogacy process I felt alone at first. My agency connected me with a single father with newborn twins (I hope he survived) who I talked to once but the poor man was overwhelmed and didn't really have time to help me with my journey. My music teacher got me connected with a friend of his who had gone through surrogacy as well and I talked with him once or twice which was very helpful. Overall, though, I felt I was one of very few people in the world who was having my experience.

I started my surrogacy blog so my child (before I knew it would be children) would know what I did to have him or her. A few weeks after I started blogging I found a blog of someone else going through surrogacy. That led me to another and another and another. Pretty soon I was connected with 20 or 30 different blogs written by intended parents and surrogates themselves. It was amazing to see all of their different stories. I felt like I had an online family.

We all supported each other as we went through our own, unique journeys. Many were thrilling. Some were heartbreaking. Most were a mix of ups and downs.

It is now four to five years after many of us became parents/gave birth or tried to at least. Not everyone's dreams were coming true when last I heard from them. There are still so many stories that stick in my head.

There is the woman who gave birth to a gay couple who lived in Poland. She flew to Poland once to visit the baby after the child was born. Her story was beautiful.

There was the altruistic surrogate who gave birth to a baby of someone she didn't know without any financial compensation and I fell in love with her heart and soul.

There was the funny gay couple in DC whose blog always made me laugh.

There was the couple who had twin boys who were a little older than my boys. They were living in India -- or maybe it was Nepal? -- for several years and if I remember correctly I believe they had moved to The Netherlands. It was fascinating to read about life as a gay couple with kids in other countries.

There was a straight couple who tried several times to get pregnant through IVF and never seemed to succeed. I believe her PCOS was a big hurdle. They kept struggling to figure out where to use their funds -- try more IVF or adopt. Every time their pregnancy test came back negative my heart sank.

There was a lesbian couple who seemed so in love with each other and they wanted a child so badly. Their pregnancy tests came back negative every time too no matter how hard I wished for a positive one.

There were two couples who had triplets. There was also a woman in Australia who had two kids and then got pregnant with triplets. Can anyone imagine having triplets?

There was the snarky lesbian who used her own eggs to give birth to a baby for her gay friends.

There was the couple who used a surrogate in India. The surrogate gave birth to boy/girl twins. The mom was literally stranded in India for months because her son was too sick to be transported back to the U.S. When she finally did get out she was dealing with a very sick boy who eventually passed away a little before his first birthday.

The last story was the most compelling. The mother wrote a blog with such compassion, humor, love and strength.

Now, years later, I wonder where all these children are. I really wish I had updates on all of these stories. There are a few parents and one or two surrogates who are my Facebook friends now. I have a few bits of information about these children and surrogates, but nowhere near the details I had as we all went through our journeys.

Many of those IPs and surrogates followed my surrogacy blog but not as many follow this one. I'll post something on that blog and if you followed my blog or I followed yours please put a message in the comments about how you're doing or post an update on your blog!